Korea’s total fertility rate — the average number of children a woman is expected to have in her lifetime — rose to 0.93 in March, up 0.15 on year. The rate has now stayed above 0.9 for three consecutive months, following readings of 0.99 in January and 0.93 in February. For the first quarter as a whole, the fertility rate stood at 0.95, up 0.12 compared to a year earlier.
The increase in births was driven largely by women in their 30s. In the first quarter, the number of births per 1,000 women aged 30 to 34 rose by 11.3 to 88.5, and the rate for women aged 35 to 39 climbed 9 to 62.4. By contrast, women aged 25 to 29 and those 40 and older showed much smaller gains of 1.7 and 0.5, respectively.
No? They are both too low? They are not very different.
No, they look not so different because the absolute numbers are not that far off. But if you try to realize what they mean and what it means if this is kept up over multiple generations you will understand that they are very different.